Earlier this year, I became entranced by the 75 year old story of Four Saints in Three Acts, a Virgil Thomson - Gertrude Stein opera whose world premiere was here in Hartford in 1934.

Beyond that lay a bigger story of the way America culture and Connecticut specifically rose to the challenge of the Great Depression. Comedy, music and cinema burst into full-flower, just because the world needed it so much. Beyond that lay a story of unimaginable misery and fear.

Our modern recession has been no picnic ...but it looks like one compared to the real story of the 1930s. 25 percent of the workforce was unemployed at one point. Nine million savings accounts just went poof, as if most of American were Bernie Madoff clients. Add to that nine years of drought and the horror of the Dust Bowl. It was, I think, like living in somebody's protracted nightmare. And yet, great deeds were done.

Today we'll talk about how Connecticut business and culture responded to the Great Depression.

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